


and you made the shape of my heart with your hands

by patriciaselina



Category: Free!
Genre: Cute, Fluff, Gen, Hints of MaRinKa, Implied Relationships, M/M, Obvious-not-obvious crushes, POV First Person, POV Multiple, Pajamas & Sleepwear, Party, Sleepovers, shameless fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-03
Updated: 2014-06-03
Packaged: 2018-02-03 06:35:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1734698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/patriciaselina/pseuds/patriciaselina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The pajamas had been Rei’s idea, which had surprised exactly no one. What surprised us was that the massive amounts of sweets had been his idea, too.</p><p>“Rei,” I had told him, when he had been setting things up earlier, “if this is your courting gift for Nagisa, you’re at least half a supermarket aisle short.”</p><p>[Fic based on the pajama picture from the Kansai event pamphlet. Just like the picture, fic has obvious-not-obvious Reigisa and hints of MaRinKa; dedicated to harukaaaaaaaa so she can forgive me for doing the Reigisa “but you didn’t” thing (again everyone who saw/reblogged/sobbed over that hello I am actually a fluff fic writer I AM GOMEN)]</p>
            </blockquote>





	and you made the shape of my heart with your hands

**Author's Note:**

> [This is a link to the corresponding Tumblr post, for people who wanna see this, and a related graphic thing I did, over there.](http://patriciaselina.tumblr.com/post/87683854711/and-you-made-the-shape-of-my-heart-with-your)

The pajamas had been Rei’s idea, which had surprised exactly no one.

What surprised us was that the massive amounts of sweets had been _his_ idea, too.

“Rei,” I had told him, when he had been setting things up earlier, “if this is your courting gift for Nagisa, you’re _at_ _least_ half a supermarket aisle short.”

The flush that formed on his face upon hearing my words had been so _very_ bright.

“What are you talking about, Haruka- _senpai_!” Rei had replied, in a tone way too high and chirpy to be anything but a lie. “ _Me_ , courting _Nagisa-kun_? The idea is _preposterous_!” As he hugged the packet of cupcakes to his chest, laughing like a maniac, I had only shrugged and set about changing into the blue polka-dot-print set of pajamas Rei got me. I’d say that Rei better stop overthinking himself to an early grave and just say what he feels already, but that’d make me a hypocrite, so I wouldn’t bother.

Polka dots – why did it _have_ to be polka dots? Well, at least it isn’t printed any kind of animal, unlike the butterfly-print ones Rei normally wears and the shark-print one he gave an unsurprisingly grateful Rin.

Speaking of which.

“Rin, you are _not_ twelve years old,” I say in my usual deadpan voice, not even needing to look behind me to just know that Rin’s wearing his usual borderline-psycho extra-toothy grin again. “Actually, even when we _were_ twelve years old, you were _still_ too old to be doing that.”

“Sharks are _never_ too old to chomp on dolphins, Haru!” Rin tells me, as he goes on pretending to take a bite out of my head with his beloved shark-headed hand puppet thing. He even goes on to make pretend-shark noises, and...Makoto, _why_ did you not get him a _normal_ shark plush. Actually, why did you get him this _in addition_ to the normal shark plush. Makoto, stop smiling at us like that.

“Mako, stop grinning at us like that, it’s creeping me out.” Rin grumbles, and I would have been weirded out by how similar his words had been to my thoughts, if I hadn’t been too busy disagreeing with him calling Makoto’s smile “ _creepy_ ”. Because the reason why I don’t like looking at that smile is not because it’s “ _creepy_ ” – it’s because that smile is too beautiful to even be real, but it is, and _oh_ spending too much time in pajamas is making me start thinking like Rei, who would’ve guessed.

Makoto’s smile only grows wider, and seeing as he’s been pretty accurate at reading my thoughts from my face thus far this might mean that he knew what I had been thinking about. _Crap_.

“Ehh? But Rin and Haru are too cute. It makes me happy, so I’m smiling.”

“C-cute? Who’s _cute_?” Rin blurts out, leaning over me to reach for Makoto with _–_ ahh, that hand puppet again. His cheeks are flushed red, a good match for the dots printed on his pajama set. Why am I noticing this. “Call me ‘ _cute_ ’ again, and we’ll see who’s boss!”

Makoto only smiles and raises an eyebrow. He’s always...dare I say, _sassier_ around Rin, which is something I never thought possible before because _sassy_ and _Makoto_ are not two words I expected to ever use in the same sentence.

“I don’t think you want to duel me with that cute little puppet of yours, Rin.” Makoto chuckles, patting the plush whose snout we’re both currently resting our heads on. The orca plush is so hilariously large that if he wasn’t too busy stuffing sponge cake down Rei’s throat _Nagisa_ could’ve made it his bed and he’d fit just fine, and in the face of both that and Makoto’s equally large stature Rin and his shark puppet look like fish chow.

But if there’s one thing that this past year that I’ve learned about Rin, it’s that he _never_ backs down from a challenge. Not even when going on would be stupid. He’s a pain that way.

“Oh, I _will_ , Mako, watch me!” he says, clambering up and over me to attack Makoto’s hair with the jagged fabric teeth of his shark puppet, making silly ‘ _chomp-chomp_ ’ noises, while Makoto laughs and playfully bats at him in turn.

These are two _eighteen-year-old men_ whose play-fight I am currently literally in the middle of. I feel so sorry for the future of humanity right about now.

“Whaddya say, Haru? I _totally_ got him, didn’t I? Didn’t I?”

“Nah, Haru, Rin didn’t even have a _chance_ , did he?”

“You are both idiots, and I am trying to sleep.”

“Aww, Haru, sleeping already? The night is _young_!” Rin says in that dramatic monologue voice of his; if swimming ever fell apart for him I’ve no clue why he didn’t just pursue theater. “Where’s your youthful spirit? It’s a sleepover, yeah, but nobody ever gets much _actual_ sleep at these things!”

“I thought we were going running tomorrow?” I ask, because Rin wakes up at butts-o’clock when he goes running and it’s a pain trying to catch up _–_ it should be _illegal_ for a guy to be so chirpy so early in the morning.

“Well, actually it’s just me and Rei who’re gonna go running, but you don’t see him sulking and saying he’s gonna fall asleep, do you?”

We look back on our two younger friends, who we’ve left to their own devices since Rin pulled the little stunt with his hand puppet, and I stifle a chuckle behind my hand because the image of Rei with his cheeks full of cake is not something you just forget anytime soon.

“Pfft, I wanna put this on Instagram.”

“Rin, it’s not _nice_ to take pictures of people without their permission,” Makoto sighs, ever the worrier. “We both know Rei wouldn’t like that. He set his Facebook profille as unsearchable, right?”

“Aww, but it’s just _one_ pic!” Rin says, whipping out his cellphone and aiming his camera. “What harm can it do-”

“ _No pictures_ , Rin-san.”

The full-body jolt that goes through Rin upon hearing Rei’s words is a sight for sore eyes. “ _Damnit_! How did you see it, when you were all too busy gazing sickeningly lovingly into Nagisa’s eyes?”

“Peripheral vision,” Rei deadpans, and immediately colors red when the second part of Rin’s sentence finally registers with him. “Also, I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”

“What’s the matter, Rei-chan?” Nagisa says, blinking owlishly as he looks up at Rei, who is taking _too much effort_ to look anywhere else _but_ at Nagisa. Rin was right about that, at the very least. “Rei-chan?”

“It’s _nothing_ , Nagisa-kun.” Rei says, pronouncing his words carefully, before he mumbles something that sounds like “ _at least I’m not mentally undressing Makoto-senpai_ ”...

Or it could’ve been “ _please amount and tally lessen Makoto multiply_ ”, for all I care. I wasn’t _at all_ paying attention to what Rei was saying just because he also fixed that pointed stare of his _my_ direction. I wasn’t affected at all, I wasn’t even _blushing_. Nope. I was _not_.

“Haru, what’s the matter?”

“ _Nothing_ ,” I say, and from this angle I can see how the pajama top neckline shows Makoto’s collarbones and _wow_ , I should not really be looking at that. “You’re hogging my side of the bed, _move_.” I say, shoving him aside with the dolphin plush I had been holding onto for that very purpose.

Makoto’s eyes grow wide, however, and he flushes red. I wonder why.

“Err, Haru?” Makoto half-whispers, eyes scrunched up and looking oddly shy. “Can you, umm, put the dolphin _somewhere else_?”

“Mm?” Surprised at his sudden shyness, I look down, down to where my hand is holding the plush, and see -

 _Oh_. Okay.

This is awkward.

But if I make as big a deal out of this as _some parts_ of me seem to want to, Rin will never let me live it down. _Ever_. And between the water and mackerel and his hunches I’ve already got a lot of stuff I wouldn’t live down in his eyes. So I keep the flush off my cheeks and tell Makoto, in my most even voice, “Not if you don’t move.”

“Err, okay,” Makoto replies, sheepishly shifting away from me, his cheeks colored a nice pink. “That enough?”

“Yeah, Mako. Haru, scooch over too!”

“You are _not_ the boss of me,” I say, turning back to Rin.

“Eh, agree to disagree. I am the boss of _everything_.” Rin says, his hand puppet nibbling at my hair again, as if for emphasis. “ _Move_. If I have to sleep on the floor with these two lovebirds again, I’d most probably die.”

“That’s not a nice thing to say, Rin. And this is Rei’s place. It doesn’t seem right for him to be taking the floor.”

“He seems fine enough,” I hear myself say without realizing it. It’s true anyway _–_ Rei had since taken off his glasses and looked down at Nagisa with that marshmallow-soft expression, as Nagisa cooed over how nice and bright his eyes were up close, as if _he_ didn’t have bright pastel-colored eyes too.

“He does, doesn’t he? So damned _obvious_.” Rin says, clucking his tongue. “Well, at least he isn’t sappily looking over _Gou_ like that. I might end up breaking his bones, which would’ve been too bad since I actually kinda _like_ that butterfly nerd.”

“Rin, I don’t think Gou-chan appreciates you laying death threats on every guy she meets just ‘cuz they happen to be guys...”

“Wait ‘til Ran-chan grows up and tell me if you still don’t get it, Mako.”

“Oh? Oh. _Oh_.”

“If your genes are any indicator you’ll be having a harder time of it than I do, trust me.”

They’re so noisy. I just want to sleep.

.

.

.

.

A few hours later. Still cannot sleep. Am this far away from joining Nagisa and Rei on floor.

“Oh, look at ‘em, all cuddled up like babies, they’re so cute! I want a picture.”

“Rin, we’ve talked about this. No Instagramming stolen shots, you promised.”

“Yeah, but what if we’re not gonna put this on Instagram?” Rin says, standing up and to the side, flashing a pair of honestly irrelevant peace signs. “You can use your phone, if you’ve gotta be so strict about it, Mako.”

“...fine, Rin, just this once.” Makoto concedes, fishing out his phone from his pockets with a hesitant smile. “Get in the shot, Haru.”

“I don’t want to.”

Makoto looks at me with a look of pure, fond exasperation, and all but pushes me into the shot. “Humor me.”

I sigh, but make no move to get out of the shot anyway. Better get this out of the way, quickly.

“Boo, Haru. You can see me pulling a perfectly spontaneous pose, right? The least you could do is, I dunno, _not_ look like a dead fish.”

“If that’s what ‘ _perfectly spontaneous_ ’ looks like I don’t want to see what ‘ ** _horribly_** _spontaneous’_ is.” I say, feeling a smirk form on my face. It’s always been so easy to rile Rin up.

“Are you talking shit about me, you _punk_ \--!?”

“Boys! _Boys_! **_Stop fighting!_** ” Makoto says, at that moment looking more like a kindergarten teacher than a high school student. “And keep quiet, you’ll wake them up. Rin, Haru, just pose for the picture now.”

Rin preens as Makoto looks at me, waiting for me to come up with some ridiculous pose par Rin’s suggestion. Ever since Rin got back to his old self, Makoto’s gotten to spoiling Rin like crazy. Why does this make my chest hurt to the point that I can’t sleep. This is tedious, and pointless. “I don’t _do_ poses.”

“‘ _Don’t think about it too much, just be free_ ,’“ Rin says, in a forced monotone, before he dissolves into rambunctious giggles. “You used to say stuff like that, right?”

Makoto sighs, looks down, and looks up at me. Is it really a time for the kicked-puppy-dog look, Makoto? Is it _really_? “Do it for me, Haru.”

“Fine,” Fine, fine, _fine_ , _alright_ , _whatever_. Makoto and that look are going to be the death of me someday. So I look behind me, because when I go with his plans Makoto does this smile and it’s absolutely important that I keep my head because Rin’s here and he shoudldn’t have to know that when Makoto smiles like that, I can’t. He already knows too much.

And what I see behind us makes me want to smile. If my smiles weren’t the kind that make people worry about my sanity.

Nagisa’s curled up into himself like a little baby _–_ or at least, that’s how Ran and Ren used to sleep when they were babies, and how Makoto slept in his baby pictures. There’s a bit of drool leaking out of his mouth and onto the _futon –_ I hope Rei doesn’t mind, but then again when Nagisa is concerned he almost _never_ does _–_ but that mouth of his is curled up into a smile, the kind he got when we all hugged after relay, when Rei first called him by his name. Must be a good dream, then. His arms are stretched out, catching two penguin plush toys and one Rei Ryugazaki in a tight embrace.

As for Rei _–_ if someone had told me when I first saw him that I would one day see him making the softest expressions _ever_ , I would’ve not believed them, but here we are. I have _never_ seen anybody look fonder in sleep, which is a big thing seeing as I grew up with _Makoto_ and have sleepovers with him frequently. His chin is snugly on top of Nagisa’s head, and one of his legs is slowly shifting to hook over Nagisa’s knees.

So I hold two thumbs up, because _holy crap my friends are **adorable**_. I won’t say this out loud of course, makes me sound like Rin.

Never mind that just doing that makes Rin hold his stomach and laugh like a madman for the next ten minutes after the flash goes off. He’ll laugh himself to sleep anyway, and Makoto’s smiling again, so it’ll all be fine.

.

.

.

I don’t think I want to get out of the position I’m in right now, which is mildly distressing because how shall I ever finish high school and university whilst embracing two penguin plush dolls and one Nagisa Hazuki? _But that’ll do_ , my sleepy mind insists _, that’ll work just **fine**_.

“I like this.”

“Ehh? What are you talking about, Rei-chan?” Nagisa asks me, his voice thick and heavy with sleep, which startles me. Because, one, did I actually think out loud, and two, _Nagisa_ is still awake at two o’clock in the morning?

On that note, three: _I_ am still awake at two o’clock in the morning!? What is happening to me?

“Rei-chan, Rei-chan,” Nagisa says, shaking me by the vice grip he has on my waist, blinking at me owlishly. “Are you all right? You were smiling earlier, saying that you liked...something, and so I thought you had a really good dream, but now you’re panicking and your face is all _red_...are you okay?”

“Never been better,” I manage to say smoothly, which is a feat seeing as, among other things, Nagisa’s arms have my waist in a vice grip; have had it in that grip for the past few hours. “Aren’t you supposed to be sleeping?”

“Aren’t _you_ supposed to be sleeping?” Nagisa _purrs_ , and _oh no_ that look on his face has got to be made illegal, please, I’ll file the necessary bureaucratic paperwork myself if I have to. “You’re avoiding the question. What is it that you like, Rei-chan?”

I decide to go with the answer that somehow includes _‘you in my arms’_ without saying it outright. Splendid decision, self. “This, all of this,” I say, looking around at the leftovers of the night _–_ Makoto- _senpai_ ’s game console on top of my television, the sweets strewn haplessly around our _futon_ (which by the way are _not_ courting gifts, not at all, where did Haruka- _senpai_ get that idea hahaha), and, on my bed, a tangled pile of snoring limbs composed of Rin and Makoto- _senpai_ and Haruka- _senpai_.

“They look cute, don’t they?” Nagisa says, giggling under his breath. “Almost like they were made to fit _perfectly_ with each other.”

“That’s nice,” I say, and because I want to be a very good friend I say this while smiling and pretending that the gaping hole in my chest that opened up when Nagisa looked at the sleeping trio with such pure and desperate longing definitely does _not_ exist.

“Yeah, it is,” Nagisa says, trailing off with a long and impressive yawn, and I am about to drop the subject, let Nagisa sleep, and swallow down these unseemly feelings of preposterous _jealousy_ , haha, why am I jealous, why does it hurt, why does everything _hurt_?

That is, however, until we both hear me say my next words, which is a stellar example of my mouth working independently of my brain, out on its own improbable volition.

“I like this. It’s as if I’m a part of the team.”

This, of course, startles Nagisa up to face me completely, worriedly, because while he’s terrible at maths he is at least fluent in Japanese grammar. “Just ‘ _as if_ ’? Rei-chan?”

“Well, I mean, of course, because you and Haruka- _senpai_ and the others have a shared past I can’t possibly be a part of, so yes -” Here I trail off in my incessant babbling to push up my glasses, but of course I’m not wearing them so this is ridiculous, and Nagisa’s hand pushes my hand away from my face...wait what?

“Stop that,” Nagisa says, looking at me completely seriously, and it makes me feel chest pains. Somewhere in the middle of the ribs, some thirteen cm leftward. “I know what that means, at least. Don’t hide your face from me now, Rei.”

I, um, well. Wow.

Did he just accidentally forget to add _‘-chan’_ , or...?

Nagisa’s looking down at our entwined hands, biting down softly on his lower lip, and his brows are furrowed like they usually are when he’s spent fifteen minutes slaving over an algebra problem, only his eyes are ten times more focused than usual. I would normally say something about this, but as things are he’s holding my hand and it’s very hard for me to think, much less speak, rationally.

“When we swum that relay, y’know what kept me paddling? I imagined that Mako-chan and Haru-chan and Rin-chan were in the same lane as me, waiting for me to catch up.” Nagisa says, kneading his thumb against my knuckles in a highly distracting manner. “And I imagined that you were swimming beside me. Holding my hand just like this.”

There is a pause where we consider the gravity of his words, and as of course I am only the most awkward sentient being in the history of forever, I speak up first.

“If that’s what you were thinking, I’m surprised that you managed to paddle, seeing as that would be difficult with only one hand free.” _Wow_. A+ work at conversation, Rei Ryugazaki. _This_ is why you have many friends.

Nagisa hasn’t seemed to hear this, however, which is a relief. He just talks on, still looking down at our hands with the softest of expressions. “I know how much you wanted to swim relay. But instead you did this, you helped Rin-chan and Haru-chan and all of us, and if not for you, none of this would’ve happened. We won’t be all here right now, snoring and hugging like babies...So _don’t you dare_ think that you’re not part of the team, Rei. Because you are. You really are.”

He says all this with such complete seriousness that it makes me want to cry because, surprise surprise, I am a _humongous_ sap, so instead of bawling openly just like the five-year-old I am really deep down, I bury my face in his hair. As would be expected, he uses strawberry-scent shampoo.

“R-Rei?” _‘Rei’_ , he says, not _‘Rei-chan’_ , and it’s intentional, it’s _intentional_ , as if all those words weren’t enough –!

“Thank you, Nagisa.” I say, and relish at the quick intake of breath that makes him hold. “Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me – _someone_ had to say it, yanno.” Nagisa yawns, burrowing closer into our embrace like some kind of cute woodland animal. Why is he cute. Why is he _always_ cute. “Remember that. Go to sleep, Rei.”

I close my eyes, and am almost asleep enough to miss his next words, but just almost.

“Love you, Rei, g’night.”

And because I am at my most honest when I am a good seventy percent asleep, I say “Love you, Nagisa,” and wish fervently that I remember all this come morning.

.

.

.

“I wanna take a picture.”

“Rin, _no_!”

“Aw, c’mon, look at’em! They look like cute little baby unicorns. _Rare_. And also _unbelievable_.”

“ _You’re_ unbelievable, Rin. Get away from there and let them sleep!”

“I took a picture.”

“Oh?”

“The best way to work over Makoto’s nagging is to _not tell him your plans_. I’m going to mail it to you.”

“Wow, thanks a lot, Haru!”

“ _Haruka Nanase, no mackerel for you!_ ”

“...on second thought, I’m _not_ going to mail it.”

“Stuff like this is why I hate you so much, Haru!”

“The feeling’s mutual, then.”

“ ** _Boys_**.”

As Rin and Haru continue bickering on their way to the table, I sigh, open a can of mackerel, and wonder what my life has come to.

Well, I still won’t exchange it for anything in the world.

.

.

.

_**fin.** _

**Author's Note:**

> Long title from "I Must Be Dreaming" by The Maine.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> ...so this is me, trying to make up for that angst thing I did. Hope you liked it!


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